The subject of this endeavor will be deliberate, constructive change in organizations that provide mental health services. Our mission will be to stimulate and facilitate the development of planned change as a legitimate and independent mental health discipline, and consistent with this mission, we will attempt to serve both as a catalyst to help the change filed assume a distinct identity and as a vehicle to provide the research and methods-testing necessary to give it technical viability. The form of change under initial investigation will be the adoption, or significant improvement, of mental health program evaluation systems. Our approach to the study of planned change in mental health services programs will have four aspects. First, we will expand the scope of Evaluation magazine to provide a link between the field of evaluation and planned change. This will give the change field a central focus and will also attract the attention of an audience which is composed of many "natural" change agents. Second, using disciplined inquiry we will research areas of knowledge prominent in the change literature. Special attention will be accorded the development of an instrument package to assess organizational readiness to change. Third, we will build on established principles to develop and evaluate practical, change-oriented technical assistance strategies. In this way we hope to mitigate the gulf between research and utilization. Fourth, as workable action guidelines emerge, we will implement a comprehensive dissemination program. The constituents of such a program would include written instructional materials and training aids, video and audio taped presentations, workshops and conferences, change agent practica and publication of a final report in book form. To insure that or project proceeds in an orderly fashion, and to elicit multiple sources of input in our operation, we will maintain regular and intensive contact with an executive faculty of noted experts and scholars in the change field.